Head of Customer Success in Derby, Derbyshire

Head of Customer Success

Derby / Derbyshire | £40,000 basic + performance bonus | Full-time

Lead growth. Build relationships. Create exceptional customer experiences.

Our client is an ambitious, growing training provider with significant opportunities to expand its apprenticeship and commercial training provision.

We are looking for an experienced Head of Customer Success to take ownership of the employer and apprentice customer journey, lead the sales function and help drive the next stage of growth.

This is a senior leadership role for someone who understands that sales and customer success go hand in hand. You will turn opportunities into successful learner starts, develop strong employer relationships, improve retention and repeat business, and ensure an excellent customer experience from first enquiry through to completion and progression.

You will report directly to the Chief Executive Officer and lead a small commercial team covering business development, marketing, communications and customer engagement.

You will also have dedicated office space to develop and lead the sales function.

The opportunity

Our client currently offers 18 apprenticeship programmes, alongside commercial training, with significant potential for growth.

A key objective is to develop a high-performing sales and customer-success operation capable of delivering 30-50 new learner starts per month.

You will review the existing pipeline with the Business Development Manager, identify genuine opportunities, improve conversion and build a repeatable sales process that creates sustainable growth.

Your key responsibilities

• Grow apprenticeship and commercial training sales.
• Build and maintain strong employer relationships.
• Win new business through tenders, bids and commercial opportunities.
• Convert qualified opportunities into appropriate learner starts.
• Lead, coach and develop the sales team.
• Improve customer satisfaction, retention and repeat business.
• Own the customer journey from enquiry through onboarding, completion and progression.
• Manage escalations, complaints and service recovery.
• Review pipeline quality, CRM performance and enquiry-to-start conversion.
• Ensure accurate handovers and effective employer onboarding.
• Work with marketing to turn campaigns into measurable enquiries and registrations.
• Use customer feedback and performance data to drive improvements.

Quality matters as much as volume. We want sustainable growth built on suitable learners, realistic commitments and excellent employer relationships.

How we will measure your success

Your scorecard will include:

• Customer satisfaction - strong employer and apprentice satisfaction with action taken on negative themes.
• Enquiry-to-start conversion - good opportunities progressing efficiently into appropriate starts.
• Customer onboarding - accurate, timely communications, handovers and employer support.
• Retention and progression - strong employer retention, repeat business and progression opportunities.
• Complaints and service recovery - issues resolved within agreed timescales.
• Assessment and completion communication - EPA bookings, results and certification coordinated effectively.
• Team performance - clear objectives, coaching and accountability.

The commercial opportunity

£40,000 basic salary

Plus a performance bonus of up to £100 for every learner secured above a threshold of 20 learners per month.

For example, consistently securing 50 new learners per month could generate approximately:

£36,000 annual bonus

giving potential total earnings of:

£76,000

Your success will have a direct and visible impact on the growth of the business.

What we are looking for

We are particularly interested in candidates with a proven track record in:

• Apprenticeship and/or commercial training sales.
• Business development and account growth.
• Winning tenders and bids.
• Building strong employer/customer relationships.
• Managing and converting a sales pipeline.
• Leading, coaching and developing sales teams.
• Improving enquiry-to-start conversion.
• Customer success, retention and repeat business.
• Using CRM and performance data to drive decisions.
• Managing customer complaints and service recovery.

You will be commercially minded, organised, confident and comfortable holding people accountable, while understanding the importance of delivering an excellent customer experience.

We are looking for someone who can balance ambitious sales targets with the judgement to ensure we make the right promises to the right employers and learners.

Why join?

This is an opportunity to join a business where your contribution will be visible.

You won't be one small part of a large corporate machine. You will have the opportunity to shape the sales function, develop the team, influence strategy and directly contribute to organisational growth.

If you are an experienced sales or customer-success leader who enjoys building something, developing people and turning opportunity into measurable growth, we'd love to hear from you.

Location

Derby / surrounding area

Salary

£40,000 basic + performance bonus

Potential earnings

Approximately £76,000 based on consistently achieving 50 learner starts per month

Reports to

Chief Executive Officer